Hello everyone! 🙂
Welcome to ‘Bradley’s Basement’ blog and I’m Tim Bradley!
2018 is almost over and we’ve nearly come to the end of my third complete year on ‘Bradley’s Basement’. How have I found this year? Um…it’s been okay. Not as good as 2016 and 2017 beforehand, but there have been some really fond highlights for me to look back on during the year.
Before the year began, I predicted that there would be more challenges for me in my normal daily life as well as on my blog. That for the most part has been true. But as it’s New Year’s Eve today, let’s take a look back at what’s been fantastic about this year and what achievements I made on my blog.
JANUARY
This year began with the last of my mini-review season of ‘Doctor Who’ stories for ‘The Nyssa Challenge’. This was on ‘A Heart On Both Sides’ starring Sarah Sutton. I had carried this over from when I started my mini ‘Nyssa Challenge’ review season right from Christmas 2017 to January 2018.
After finishing a number of Christmas reviews carried over from the previous year, I added a new page to my blog for the ‘Beethoven’ movie series as well as reviews on the first three films of that series. I added my three reviews on ‘The Dark Knight Trilogy’ with Christian Bale as Batman himself.
I added the first story of my third season of ‘Doctor Who’ fan fiction stories in ‘The Fifth Doctor by Tim Bradley’ series. This was a six-part adventure called ‘Dawn of the Dwaxi’, featuring the Fifth Doctor, Nyssa and Billy. The trio returned to Billy’s 1960s home and they fought the dreaded Dwaxi.
In terms of movies at the cinema in January, I saw ‘The Greatest Showman’ starring Hugh Jackman. I also saw ‘Jumanji: Welcome To The Jungle’ starring Dwayne Johnson and Karen Gillan; ‘Darkest Hour’ starring Gary Oldman and the Aardman animated film, ‘Early Man’, starring Eddie Redmayne.
FEBRUARY
In February, I shared my convention memories blog post on my first ‘Doctor Who’ convention back in February 2010, which was a Fantom Films event called ‘Fifth Element’. This year, my Dad purchased the Blu-ray box set of ‘The Hobbit’ and ‘The Lord of the Rings’ movies. This was a six-film box set featuring all of the Peter Jackson directed movies set in Middle-Earth created by J.R.R. Tolkien. It was pretty wonderful to revisit the six epic movies on Blu-ray here!
My parents and I had a day trip to Castell Coch in the Cardiff area that month, which was fun to do. I took photos with my Samsung phone camera that day. I also saw the movies, ‘The Shape of Water’ and ‘Black Panther’ at the cinema as well as reviewing ‘Star Trek: The Next Generation’ – Season 3.
MARCH
March was a peculiar month this year. From late February into March, it was snowing. The snow was heavy and came late after Christmas! 😀 I took plenty of photos of the snow in the area where I lived. It was pretty amazing to see so much snow that spread far and wide across the UK that March.
My Mum’s birthday also came that month. She had ‘Mission: Impossible’ galore on Blu-ray since she saw ‘Mission: Impossible’ and ‘Mission: Impossible III’ on her birthday and ‘Mission: Impossible 2’ and ‘Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol’ for Mother’s Day. I’ll be reviewing those movies again soon.
I also added my second and last ‘Doctor Who’ story from my third season of fan-fiction stories in ‘The Fifth Doctor by Tim Bradley’ series called ‘The Stockbridge Terror’. This featured a return to Stockbridge as well as the return of Maxwell Edison; Andrew Whittaker and the monstrous Sontarans.
I created a new ‘BBV’ page on my blog, featuring reviews on ‘Do You Have A Licence To Save This Planet?’ and ‘The Airzone Solution’. I also created the ‘Oh Doctor Beeching!’ page and reviewed the complete series in the year. My parents and I finished the ‘Allo, ‘Allo’ series and I reviewed ‘Monkey Trouble’.
Tim Bradley with Sarah Sutton and Peter Davison at the ‘Carlisle Comic Con’, March 2018
March was also a particularly exciting month for me! I got to see Sarah Sutton and Peter Davison that month. It was the first of two conventions this year and it was the ‘Carlisle Comic Con’. I enjoyed reuniting with Sarah and Peter, my favourite ‘Doctor Who’ stars, since I had lovely chats with them.
I also saw the movie ‘Peter Rabbit’ at the cinema, which I really enjoyed. I also enjoyed the birthday present I gave to my Mum that March which was the BBC sitcom series, ‘Sink or Swim’, starring Peter Davison and Robert Glenister. I also saw the blockbuster hit film, ‘Ready Player One’, at the cinema.
It was Easter time again that month in March instead of April this year. I celebrated the good news of Jesus’ resurrection that month on Good Friday and Easter Sunday. I also reviewed the 14-part MJTV ‘Soldiers of Love’ CD series. This featured stars like Sarah Sutton, Nicholas Courtney, Colin Baker, Gareth Thomas, Anna Karen and Jacqueline Pearce.
APRIL
For April this year, I created a new Sci-Fi page on my blog. This collected together all of the sci-fi related pages and reviews on my blog including ‘Doctor Who’, ‘Star Trek’, ‘Star Wars’, ‘Soldiers of Love’ and ‘Back to the Future’. I also created a brand new page for the ‘Thunderbirds’ TV series from the 1960s.
In terms of the cinema in April, I went to see a re-release of ‘The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring’. It was an amazing experience as I saw the extended version of the movie at the cinema. I also created a new ‘Middle-Earth’ page to collect all of my ‘Hobbit’ and ‘The Lord of the Rings’ reviews.
My parents and I also finished watching the TV drama series, ‘A Family At War’, which we started watching back in mid-2017. I enjoyed watching that TV drama series, although I doubt I’ll be watching it again with my family and I doubt I will be reviewing every episode from its three seasons on my blog.
MAY
May has to be my favourite month of the year 2018! It started off well with me adding my new page on the ‘All Creatures Great and Small’ TV series, starring Christopher Timothy, Robert Hardy and Peter Davison. I began reviewing the series in May. I am currently on Series 3 of ‘All Creatures’ as 2018 ends.
I did my ‘Mayday’ blog post for Bank Holiday Monday in May 2018. It was on my visit to Swansea and Swansea Beach that weekend. It was an amazingly gloriously sunny day and I took photos. This was before I celebrated my birthday that month and I must say it has to be the best birthday I’ve ever had so far. 😀
For my birthday, I saw the movie ‘Avengers: Infinity War’ at the cinema whilst also having a Frankie & Benny’s restaurant meal. Also in that month, I had birthday DVDs of ‘Pudsey the Dog: The Movie’ from my parents and ‘Gravity’; ‘Lady In The Water’ and ‘The Cable Guy’ from my best mate, Stephen.
I also saw Sarah Sutton, Peter Davison and Janet Fielding for my birthday weekend at the ‘Folkestone Film and Comic Con’ that May. I couldn’t have asked for a lovelier birthday present and it was great to catch up and to share my birthday with Sarah; Peter and Janet for that exciting convention weekend.
I also added my reviews on the ‘Classic Mystery Agatha Christie Collection’, featuring four films starring Margaret Rutherford as Miss Marple. These reviews have been added onto ‘The World of Agatha Christie’ page on my blog. I also reviewed ‘Star Trek: The Next Generation’ – Season 4′ in that month.
This year, I saw ‘Harry Hill’s Alien Fun Capsule’ TV show on ITV1. It featured Harry Hill with some celebrities doing some comedic stuff and it was shown on Saturdays from April to June. The highlight was seeing Peter Davison guest star in one of the episodes and doing the Chair Jam challenge for it. 😀
I also made a start on reviewing Phase One of the ‘Marvel Cinematic Universe’ film series from May into June 2018. This was on ‘Iron Man’, ‘The Incredible Hulk’, ‘Iron Man 2’, ‘Thor’, ‘Captain America: The First Avenger’ and ‘Avengers Assemble’ for my ‘Marvel Cinematic Universe Film Review Season’.
JUNE
In June, I started doing a repeat of my second season of ‘Doctor Who’ fan-fiction stories featured in ‘The Fifth Doctor by Tim Bradley’ series. This was on ‘The Salvador Trilogy’ and the first story from that was ‘The Austen Code’, starring the Fifth Doctor, Nyssa and Billy as they meet Jane Austen in Bath.
In terms of movies at the cinema, I saw a re-release of the 1968 sci-fi classic hit ‘2001: A Space Odyssey’ by Stanley Kubrick with my parents. I also saw the film ‘Solo: A Star Wars Story’ at the cinema. At the end of the month, I saw the film ‘Patrick’ with my parents and I enjoyed that very much.
This year, I’ve changed things around with how I handle and manage my ‘Doctor Who’ pages on my blog. As well as adding the new logo, I’ve collected all of my pages and reviews related to ‘Doctor Who’, including ‘Doctor Who Timelines’, ‘The Fifth Doctor by Tim Bradley’, ‘Short Trips by Tim Bradley’, etc.
I’ve also updated a lot of my ‘Nyssa Challenge’ reviews with some new information, pictures and articles related to stories like ‘Kinda’, ‘The Visitation’, ‘Black Orchid’, ‘Time-Flight’ and ‘Snakedance’. I’ve also added my review on the animation ‘Dad’s Army’ episode, ‘A Stripe For Frazer’, from Series 2.
JULY
For July, I continued the repeat of my second season of ‘Doctor Who’ fan-fiction stories in ‘The Fifth Doctor by Tim Bradley’ with ‘Junglos 4198’ and ‘Chieftain’s Caves’ from ‘The Salvador Trilogy’. These two stories featured the Fifth Doctor, Nyssa and Billy confronting the villainous and vengeful Salvador.
This year, I’ve been celebrating ‘Dad’s Army’s 50th anniversary. As well as reviewing the ‘A Stripe For Frazer’ animation episode, my parents and I saw the ‘Dad’s Army’ theatre production at the Cardiff Open Air Theatre Festival. We also saw ‘Fiddler On The Roof’ at that Cardiff Open Air Theatre Festival.
For this month, I finished reviewing ‘Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers’ – Season 1′ which I started watching from July 2017. I’m currently watching Season 2 of ‘Mighty Morphin’ and hope to finish reviewing all of the episodes before 2019 ends. I also updated my ‘Laurel & Hardy’ reviews on my blog.
In terms of movies at the cinema in July, I saw ‘Incredibles 2’ (with the Pixar short film ‘Bao’); ‘Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again!’ and ‘Mission: Impossible – Fallout’ at the cinema. I especially enjoyed ‘Mission: Impossible – Fallout’ since I saw it twice at the cinema and I’ve bought the Blu-ray for my Mum for Christmas 2018.
I also did my ‘Roald Dahl Film Review Season’ that month, taking a look at four films including ‘James and the Giant Peach’, ‘Danny the Champion of the World’, ‘Matilda’ and ‘Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory’. I’ve added these four new film reviews to my new page, ‘The World of Roald Dahl’, on my blog.
AUGUST
August wasn’t a particularly exciting month, although I did conclude my repeat of ‘Chieftain’s Caves’ from ‘The Salvador Trilogy’ in ‘The Fifth Doctor by Tim Bradley’ series. I also continued to review ‘All Creatures Great and Small’ as well as some ‘Doctor Who’ stories and ‘Star Trek: TNG’ episodes.
I saw the movies ‘Christopher Robin’ and ‘Ant-Man and the Wasp’ at the cinema. Both these movies were very good in their own way. Sadly this year saw the passing of Barry Chuckle, one of the Chuckle Brothers from ‘Chucklevision’. It was such sad news to hear as I loved watching ‘Chucklevision’ on TV.
This year, I’ve been updating a lot of old reviews from my Amazon days and added them to the blog. This includes reviews on ‘Doctor Who’ Big Finish stories like the lost Season 27, ‘The Fourth Doctor Box Set’, ‘Lords of the Red Planet’, etc. I still have some more old Amazon reviews left in my drafts folder! 😀
SEPTEMBER
For September, I reviewed all of ‘Star Trek: The Next Generation’ – Season 5′ on my blog. I also added my new page for ‘The Man From U.N.C.L.E.’ series as well as reviews on five movie versions of TV episodes from the series. I hope I will be tackling the actual TV series at some point in the near future.
I also added two Short Trips to my blog for this month. These include ‘Fred and the Doctor’ featuring the Sixth Doctor and ‘The Impossible Girl Returns’ featuring Clara Oswald and Danny Pink. ‘The Impossible Girl Returns’ is a follow-up to Series 9 of ‘Doctor Who’, which I reviewed all of on ‘Bradley’s Basement’.
The highlight of September was my parents and I having our caravan summer holiday third year running in Amroth. We were there from Sunday the 2nd to Friday the 7th of September, visiting Tenby and Caldey Island; Wiseman’s Bridge and Saundersfoot and finally the National Botanic Garden of Wales.
I decided to continue sharing convention memories posts on my blog, following on from the ‘Fifth Element‘ blog post in February. The next one for this month in September was on the ‘Regenerations 2010’ event, September 2010. I hope to continue this ‘convention memories’ blog post series in 2019.
In memory of my late sister Bethan on her birthday, I added my Disney DVD review on the 1977 film, ‘Pete’s Dragon’. I’d like to think I’ve started a tradition on my blog with adding a Disney film review every September to commemorate my sister Bethan’s birthday. I believe I’ll be reviewing ‘The Little Mermaid’ next in 2019.
I also started my ‘Marvel Cinematic Film Review Season 2’ by looking into Phase Two of the ‘Marvel Cinematic Universe’ film series. I reviewed ‘Iron Man 3’, ‘Thor: The Dark World’, ‘Captain America: The Winter Soldier’, ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’, ‘Avengers: Age of Ultron’ and ‘Ant-Man’ in that season.
The last day of September 2018 marked the 3rd anniversary of my ‘Bradley’s Basement’ blog. To celebrate, I added my timelines for the Thirteenth Doctor era of ‘Doctor Who’, including timelines for the Thirteenth Doctor, Graham O’Brien, Ryan Sinclair and Yasmin Khan before Series 11 started on TV.
OCTOBER
October was another highlight of a month for me in 2018. First of all, I finished reviewing all of Series 1 of the ‘Dad’s Army’ radio series. This was to continue celebrating the BBC sitcom series’ 50th anniversary. I’m currently enjoying Series 2 of the ‘Dad’s Army’ radio series as I’m reviewing it right into 2019.
But the biggest excitement for me was watching Series 11 of ‘Doctor Who’ with Jodie Whittaker, Bradley Walsh, Tosin Cole and Mandip Gill. I love the new Thirteenth Doctor era as I enjoyed ‘The Woman Who Fell To Earth’, ‘The Ghost Monument’, ‘Rosa’ and ‘Arachnids In The UK’ in the month.
At the cinema, I saw the movies ‘Venom’ and ‘Johnny English Strikes Again’. I did enjoy these movies, although both weren’t excellent in equal measure. ‘Venom’ is worse than ‘Johnny English Strikes Again’ and ‘Johnny English Strikes Again’ is not as good as the first two ‘Johnny English’ films.
Tim Bradley with the cast and crew of ‘Star Trek: Deep Space Nine’ at ‘Destination Star Trek Birmingham’, NEC Birmingham, October 2018
Another big highlight for me this month was attending the ‘Destination Star Trek Birmingham’ convention at the NEC Birmingham. This was an exciting weekend and an amazing experience for me as I saw my favourite ‘Star Trek’ stars including William Shatner, Michael Dorn, Gates McFadden, Marina Sirtis, Nana Visitor, Alexander Siddig, Terry Farrell, Kate Mulgrew, Jeri Ryan, etc.
NOVEMBER
November was another busy month, as I celebrated the 55th anniversary of ‘Doctor Who’. I shared reviews on ‘Doctor Who’ stories covering each era of the show from the First to the Thirteenth Doctors as well as the War Doctor and a number of possible alternative Doctors outside the show’s continuity. My last review ‘The Many Lives of Doctor Who’ was my definite anniversary celebration.
I continued to enjoy Series 11 of ‘Doctor Who’ with the episodes ‘The Tsuranga Conundrum’, ‘Demons of the Punjab’, ‘Kerblam!’ and ‘The Witchfinders’. Jodie Whittaker was growing on me as the new Thirteenth Doctor and so were her companions, Bradley Walsh, Tosin Cole and Mandip Gill.
I finished my reviews on ‘Star Trek: The Next Generation – Season 6’. I also saw ‘Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald’ at the cinema; added my latest ‘Peter Pan’ review on the film ‘Hook’ with Robin Williams and added my review on the film, ‘Stormbreaker’, for the new Alex Rider page on ‘Bradley’s Basement’. Sadly, Marvel superhero creator and writer Stan Lee passed away this year.
I shared a little two-part mini-story called ‘Time Burp’ featuring the Fifth Doctor, Nyssa and Billy in ‘The Fifth Doctor by Tim Bradley’ series. In that, they came up against a Harry Hill-like character causing trouble by presenting his comedy show and bringing a Dalek and a Sontaran into the TARDIS.
DECEMBER
For December, the last month of 2018, I created a new Christmas banner for my blog which I hope to reuse for future Christmas seasons on ‘Bradley’s Basement’. I also did my ‘Bradley’s Basement‘s Advent Calendar for 2018, which I shared some photo memories of my Christmas back during 2008.
I also shared four Christmas reviews on my blog for the films, ‘Elf’, ‘The Shop Around The Corner’, ‘Jingle All The Way’ and ‘The Nativity Story’. I hope to make this a Christmas tradition where I share four Christmas film reviews per week in December in the build-up to Christmas season in every year.
I also saw the last two episodes of Series 11 in ‘Doctor Who’ starring Jodie Whittaker, including ‘It Takes You Away’ and ‘The Battle of Ranskoor Av Kolos’. Sadly there was no Christmas Special of ‘Doctor Who’ shown for this year, but I am looking forward to the New Year’s Day Special tomorrow.
I also shared the third episode of the ‘Merry Christmas From The Doctor, Nyssa and Billy’ anthology in ‘The Fifth Doctor by Tim Bradley’ series called ‘Cuddles’. I also shared two Short Trips including ‘Light-Ground’ with the Fifth Doctor, Nyssa and Billy and ‘The Five Doctors At Christmas’ featuring the Second, Fourth, Fifth, Seventh and Tenth Doctors against the Daleks and Cybermen at Christmas.
I saw three movies in December at the cinema including ‘Home Alone 2: Lost In New York’; ‘Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse’ and ‘Mary Poppins Returns’. I hope to continue watching December movie releases in January 2019. Sadly 2018 saw the passing of June Whitfield from ‘Terry and June’.
For Christmas Day, I shared my annual Christmas post wishing everyone a Happy Christmas as well seeing the ‘Call the Midwife’ 2018 Christmas Special. I also started my ‘Nyssa Challenge’ mini-review season that focused on the 2017 and 2018 trilogies of ‘Doctor Who’ audio tales by Big Finish.
This year, I’ve added new ‘Doctor Who Timelines’ on my blog for the Counter-Measures team, the Rutans, the Wirrn, Lady Christina de Souza, Anji Kapoor, the Seven Keys Doctor, the Meta-Crisis Doctor, Alison Cheney, Josie Day, Gabby Gonzalez, Cindy Wu and Alice Obiefune. These have been added to the respective timelines indexes that I currently hold on my ‘Bradley’s Basement’ today.
I’ve done a review on the movie novelization of ‘Batman Forever’ this year as well as doing a Quick TV soundtrack review on the ‘Doctor Who’ story, ‘City of Death’. I made a start on the ‘Doctor Who’/’Mr. Men’ books by doing a YouTube review on ‘Dr. First’. I’ve been slow getting onto the other ‘Doctor Who’/’Mr. Men’ books in that collection, but when I’ve more time I hope to do more. Check out this blog post for other news and updates on ‘Doctor Who’ reviews in 2019.
I got a chance to review Series 9 of ‘Doctor Who’ with Peter Capaldi and Jenna Coleman. This was a season of the ‘Doctor Who’ TV series shown at the same time that I created my ‘Bradley’s Basement’ blog in September 2015. I also did a blog post on ‘Clara’s Journey’ following from Series 9 as well as doing reviews on ‘Doctor Who: The Ultimate Documentaries’ with Peter Davison as the presenter.
On my birthday in May, I also had the four new series ‘Doctor Who’ Target novelizations on ‘Rose’, ‘The Christmas Invasion’, ‘The Day of the Doctor’ and ‘Twice Upon A Time’. I did reviews on each of the four Target novelizations during the summer. I also had the slimmer ‘City of Death’ novelization.
Whilst doing my repeat season of ‘The Salvador Trilogy’ from June to August, I did the ‘Making ‘The Salvador Trilogy’ blog posts for each of the three stories including for ‘The Austen Code’, ‘Junglos 4198’ and ‘Chieftain’s Caves’. In terms of future plans for ‘Fifth Doctor’ stories by me, check out this blog post.
I’m very pleased I got to see Peter Davison and Sarah Sutton, my favourite TARDIS duo, at the ‘Carlisle Comic Con’ and the ‘Folkestone Film, TV and Comic Con’ this year. However, I wish I’d seen more of them at conventions as there seemed fewer events with the two attending together this year.
I suppose that’s why I didn’t find 2018 as great as 2016 and 2017, as I’ve been spoiled with seeing my two favourite ‘Doctor Who’ stars at many conventions lately. But I’m hopeful things will be better in the New Year and I’ll get to see Peter Davison and Sarah Sutton at convention together again someday.
Otherwise, 2018 has been a satisfying year for me. It started off well and exciting for me in the first half, with a dip during the middle, before getting exciting towards the end. I’m glad 2018 has been okay and I’m really looking forward to what’s coming next for ‘Bradley’s Basement’ in the New Year.
Thanks for reading!
Bye for now and best wishes!
See you next year! 😀
Tim. 🙂
Bradley's Basement 